In the face of challenges encountered by the RMG (real money gaming) sector, there is a positive and favorable outlook for gaming, animation, and VFX policies. Google Play is actively keeping pace with this trend. Addressing the growing demand in this category, Google Play has announced plans to expand support for more RMG apps this year. This includes covering game types and operators not currently addressed by existing licensing frameworks, as outlined in the internet giant’s blog post on January 11. Karan Gambhir – Director, Global Trust and Safety Partnerships
“As a platform, we strive to help developers responsibly build new businesses and reach wider audiences across a variety of content types and genres. In response to strong demand, in 2021 we began onboarding a wider range of real-money gaming (RMG) apps in markets with pre-existing licensing frameworks. Since then, this app category has continued to flourish with developers creating new RMG experiences for mobile,” said Karan Gambhir – director, global trust and safety partnerships, at Google.
Per the blog post, Google has conducted several pilot programs to determine how to support more RMG operators and game types.
This new development is based on the insights gained from these pilots and the positive feedback received from users and developers.
“We’ll launch this expanded RMG support in June to developers for their users in India, Mexico, and Brazil, and plan to expand to users in more countries in the future.We’re pleased that this new approach will provide new business opportunities to developers globally while continuing to prioritise user safety. It also enables developers currently participating in RMG pilots in India and Mexico to continue offering their apps on Play,” Gambhir added.
For developers in the Google Play Pilot Program for distributing DFS (daily fantasy sports) and Rummy apps to users in India, Google is extending the grace period for pilot apps to remain on Google Play until June 30, 2024 when the new policy will take effect.
After that time, developers can distribute RMG apps on Google Play to users in India, beyond DFS and Rummy, in compliance with local laws and our updated policy.
Stakeholders naturally welcomed the move.
“We have been advocating the same for and believe that this will give a big boost to the Indian online gaming industry, where over 70 percent of the revenue is generated by Pay to Play platforms,” said Roland Landers, CEO, All India Gaming Federation.
According to him, this decision will help with responsible innovation and provide a bouquet of choices to the Indian consumer. It will especially help MSMEs and new developers/platforms who will be able to compete with established companies, and will substantially bring down the user acquisition and other associated costs.
The move will do much more than fuel ideas of fostering innovation and enhancing user experience.
“This will also help curb illegal practices and offshore gambling menace while cultivating the idea of responsible gaming in India, making users aware of distinguishing between skill and chance games,” said Puneet Singh, Co-Founder, Baazi Games.